


Don't lock the door on me

by TuskFM



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Bucky Barnes's Metal Arm, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Gunshot Wounds, Hurt/Comfort, Knife Wounds, M/M, POV Sam Wilson, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Slash, but that's it after that movie no canon is accepted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:00:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24343891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TuskFM/pseuds/TuskFM
Summary: Sam’s desperately trying to sleep when he gets a visit from the Winter Soldier at three a.m., bleeding and asking for help. Sam’s not the kind of guy who let someone bleed out on his front door, even if the said someone threw him off an helicarrier and stole his wheel.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Sam Wilson
Comments: 10
Kudos: 131





	Don't lock the door on me

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings (slight spoiler) : There are rather graphic descriptions of knife and bullet wounds, and explicit talks about Bucky’s arm, how he got it and some injuries related to it, as well as talks about Bucky’s trauma and time with Hydra. Sam briefly talks about his past, Riley and some mental health problem.
> 
> This was mostly self indulgent, don't mind the medical mistakes. Enjoy!
> 
> Title from Stranded by Gojira

Sam is finally at home after more than four months in the most freezing part of eastern Europe chasing cold leads and dead-end trails. It’s been a year since Steve almost died at the hand of the Winter Solider, zealous fist of Hydra and expert assassin, and a year since they both started to look for James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes, longest POW and amnesiac American solider and childhood friend of Captain America himself. And it’s not that Sam hates Bucky, or Steve, but he’s pretty sure he shed a tear when he touched his mattress when he came back home. Motels on the side of the road and busted Hydra base after busted Hydra base wore them both down, and it’s after yet another failed operation that Steve finally blew up and yelled at Sam. Sam put an end to it, told Steve to walk it off and get angry at the right person, and decided that they’d be home the very next day, both of them, period.

After buying some milk, coffee, enough take out to hold on at least a week-end and throwing out the now dead plant he had; he slept for an entire day, and that's been his schedule for the past few days now. Eat, sleep, catch up on his favorite shows and with his friends -just to make sure he’s not alienating himself from his own life with the work he does with Steve. But now it’s past three a.m. and he’s having trouble sleeping after that two hours long nap he took this afternoon. He's kinda regretting it. Not the lazy afternoons, those are nice, but that late coffee wasn’t the wisest choices now that he’s having a stare down with that one broken shutter on his window.

He’s brought out of his thoughts by a knock at his front door. It’s quite effective really, no one’s supposed to come by. Steve took his bike to the countryside, so there’s no chance he’s here unless it’s an emergency, and his other friends aren’t crackhead so they would at least send a text before showing up at his door. Sam checks the two phones on his nightstand, nothing on his personal one, just like the burner phone he keeps for the leads and sensitive matters. He slides on his feet and put on the pair of sneakers he keeps by his bed for this exact situation. The Glock under his pillow is in his hands in no time and he walk up to his front door, arms already coiled tight, thumb hovering over the safety.

He might be prepared to fight whatever’s coming at him, but he sure wasn’t ready to see the Winter Soldier standing there, looking agar, eyes sunk in and jumping from left to right. It’s too dark in the hallway to really see what’s he doing, or holding, but Sam can make out his worn face, and obvious defiance in his stance. He turns the light on once he realizes Bucky’s fixing the peephole, and he’s maybe eighty percent sure that he can see him on the other side.

“Who is it?” He calls, still aiming through the door.

“I’m not- I'm not dangerous.” He answers, and the hesitation in his voice is what makes Sam frowns. “I need help.” Bucky says, but this time quieter.

“Are you in danger? Anyone following you?”

“No, I’m alone.” Bucky says, and Sam… Sam's a madman who strapped an experimental jet on his back, followed Captain America in the battle field and has that deep rooted need to help people. Still aiming his gun, he opens the lock and throws the door open quickly enough to put his hand back on the cross under a few second, pointing directly at Bucky’s head. Sam’s pretty sure he became Bucky in his mind on their second week in Asia, during the fourth night he spent listening to Steve’s reminiscent stories of the forties, double dates and street brawls with his best friend.

With the light from his living room, Bucky looks even more worn than in the dark. He’s sporting a pair of relatively clean jeans apart from a couple of grease stains, and a thick jacket over a black pullover. There’s a baseball cap pulled low on his eyes that also serves to hold back his hair and it would look stupid to wear such hat at night but Sam knows what it’s like to hide in plain sight. Bucky has a bag, neatly clipped on his torso and a pair of old gloves on both of his hands. Over all, he looks more like a homeless person than a highly trained assassin, which is certainly the goal he had in mind while putting together this outfit.

“Do you know who you are?” Sam asks, trying to keep his worry for himself. He has no idea why he’s here, or how he knows where he lives. He tried to not leave any lead behind, but apparently the Winter Soldier didn’t get his reputation for nothing.

“I’ve read about me.” Bucky says, and he hasn’t moved. He’s not poised on his feet and tensed like Sam, but he’s seen the Black Widow. He knows the kind of training they have make them deadly without even looking dangerous. “I know my name, and the memories are coming back.” He’s surprisingly articulate, and from what Steve told Sam it wasn’t like that at the Triskelion. “I’m not with Hydra.” He adds, with a hint of desperation in his voice, like he’s trying to proves himself to Sam. Which, he is.

“Do you know who I am?” Sam asks, not moving an inch, and Bucky respect the distance between them.

“Samuel Thomas Wilson.” He answers. “I remember fighting you, and fighting Steve. I’ve also searched some information about you. Mainly where you live.” He’s careful with his words, they feel rehearsed, chosen carefully. Sam is not happy about being spied on, but it’s to be expected now that he’s an Avenger. Still, not thrilled to have his home found so easily.

“Where did you get my address?”

“I searched for your name, found you worked at the VA office. Checked the employee records.”

“Damn it…” Sam quietly swears. That’s what you get for staying true to yourself. He’ll have to do something about that, and soon. “Why are you here?” Sam decides to focus on the bigger problem, which is the Winter Soldier standing in his hallway. He doesn’t lower his gun a second.

“Like I said, I need help. I didn’t know where to go.”

“Why not Steve if you remember who he is?” And Bucky looks away, leaving him out of his sight. It’s just enough hesitation, enough emotion sipping through his carefully blank face to make Sam falter. That is not the face of a brainwashed weapon. It's a man out of option going to the less dangerous one he has at hand.

“You got any weapons on you?” He asks, because he might like to taunt fate but he’s not a complete idiot.

“A gun, shot my last bullet yesterday. I have two knives, and my arm’s dead.”

“I’m sorry, your what?”

“My arm’s dead, that’s why I'm here.” Bucky jerks his head to his left side, and Sam takes his eyes off him for a second to look at the apparently limp shoulder. He's not sure if it’s bluff or not, but he decides to trust him. He steps away and point to the room behind himself with his head, Bucky nods once and quickly skirt around him into the flat.

He closes the door behind Bucky, and once he’s in the light Sam see how bad he looks. He has lost weight since the last time he saw him. He's closer to the pictures taken when he first fell into Hydra’s hand, the bulk of his clothes hide his body but his face looks gaunt, skin pulled over his cheekbones and eyes sunken, circled by deep purple bags. He's got a few scratches over his right side, and the still red mark of a split lip. With his serum Sam isn’t sure how long it takes him to heal, but those look fresh enough; maybe a couple of days top.

But the most worrying thing is the way he limps into the flat, the shiny patch over the pullover that doesn’t look like a coffee stain at all. Sam immediately put the safety back on and slide the gun in the back of his sweatpants.

“What happened?”

“Do you have music?” Bucky asks back, and Sam knows where this is going.

“I don’t have bugs here. I check every week.” Bucky levels him with a look no one asking for help should have if they want that help. “It’s three a.m., I can’t put on the stereo.”

“I’m sure you have something nice to listen to.” 

“Man, my neighbors are gonna hate me, I swear.” Not counting the many nights he came back more than late, being friend a couple super soldier, spies, or heroes isn’t a quiet activity. With a sigh, Sam goes to his hi fi set up and pics a mix tape from his first tour in Afgha, nice and soothing RnB and hip hop that Sarah gave him. Hopefully it won’t rally all the building against him. It’s mostly 2000s stuff, but sue him he likes his music retro.

“What happened?” He points Bucky the couch, but he walks over to the table and takes a chair instead, met out a painted sigh as he sits down.

“I was found by a small groups of rogue Hydra agent. I manage to get rid of them, but they took my arm out.”

“How did they manage that?” He remembers Natasha explained the electric disk she used but it was temporary, it would take something big to stop that piece of machinery. Alicia Keys slowly fills the room once he hits play. It shouldn’t upset the neighbors. Right?

“They used cattle prods. And they stabbed it with them.” Bucky looks away and sharply breath in.

“Did they stab anything else?” Sam asks while he goes fetch his first aid kit from his kitchen along with a bowl of warm water.

“Me.” He says and Sam has to stop for a moment. He can’t believe the Winter Soldier is in his living room, having a conversation about being stabbed like it’s a detail.

“Wait. Was that a joke?” He asks, turning around to look at Bucky who’s sitting with the door right in front of him, gripping the table with his right hand.

“Maybe.” Bucky throws a look at Sam, and he swears the asshole’s smirking under the pained frowns and rough beard covering his face. He walks back to the table and set the kit there with a bunch of old towels already blood stained. Being the Falcon isn’t a risk-free job.

“Okay, I need you to tell me real quick what you remember, how and why, and also what the hell you’ve been doing for the past year while we were looking for you everywhere.” Bucky doesn’t look ashamed at that, but that may be the exhaustion freezing his face still.

“I left the country after beating Steve to death, spent four weeks in excruciating pain while I went in a withdrawal and the bastardized version of the serum I was given tried to reassemble the literal smoothie I had for a brain.” He rattles off smoothly, like a song you’re tired of hearing, and Sam can’t help but stare at him, his nervous laugh held back by the sheer violence of the words Bucky is using. It could be hilarious if it wasn’t so horrible. “I remember a lot, not all, but a lot. I know I grew up in the 30s with Steve, we were friends, I went to the war, he became Captain America. He saved me, I fought with him, the books said I died but I didn’t. I remember Hydra giving me the arm, training me, using electric shocks to wipe my brain and make me their perfect weapon while I was blank enough to believe the lies they fed me.” Bucky looks away, hand squeezed into a lose fist over his thighs. “I know all my missions, and remember most of them. I remember seeing Steve and running away.”

“So, you’re conscious of who you are?” Sam is carefully choosing his words.

“There’s a lot I don’t remember, missing pieces, important part of my life like my childhood are gone, but the big lines? I have them. I know them. I live with them.” He says more quietly, and Sam decide to ignore the dark tone as he walks back to the table with the pot of boiled water.

“Okay, so you’re not a murderbot sent by Hydra, cool.” It’s three a.m. and he’s this close to a flip out. He spent more than a year looking for Bucky, no less than four months running after him in Lithuania and Romania only to have him show up out of the blue on his door step? Okay, no problem. It's fine. Everything’s fine. He’s not bleeding out either, so it’s okay. Absolutely. Fine.

“Are you okay with me touching you?” He asks because Bucky’s still a traumatized and abused human being, no matter how coherent and put together he looks, and they’re known to react violently. Sam still remembers that POW he rescued in ‘04 that punched him so hard he had a black eye for a week because he grabbed him from behind.

“I am.” Bucky nods and unfasten the clip of his bag and shrugs it off, pushing it under the chair he’s sitting on.

“Okay.” Sam huffs a breath and step closer to Bucky. He feels like he’s handling a ticking bomb right now, he’s really not prepared for that level of stress at this hour. He was supposed to have the week off work. “Can you take off your hoodie?”

“Don’t think I can, I can’t move my shoulder.” He says, but he tries to take off his right sleeve anyway, without much success.

“Can you let me take it off?” Sam asks, and he lets his training take over him. There's a man wounded in his apartment, he knows how to fix him up so he’s gonna do that for now and worry about the rest later.

“Sure.” Bucky grunts. Sam nods one last time and get to work. It's ridiculously hard work, taking off the right sleeve of his heavy jean jacket before sliding off the rest and draping over a chair, but it’s worse with the hoodie, because there’s no zip, and Bucky insist on taking it off and not cutting it.

“Why man, it’s ruined. Look at that.” He points at the hole tearing it in the front, and at the numerous tears and stains over it. Apparently, Bucky was busy.

“I said, don’t cut it.” He grunts through his teeth. “I can manage.” His jaw is way too tensed, but Sam is not about to argue with him, not right now. He does shake his head at him and tug on the right sleeve. He's a big boy, he can take it. After some long minutes, the hoodie and what used to be a t shirt are both off, and it’s only thanks to his training that Sam doesn't stare at him.

The stab wound isn’t too bad. It’s a few days old, and it’s not looking good but Sam was expecting guts gushing out so that’s a relief. It looks more like a slice in the skin than a hole so it probably didn’t hit any vital organs. It is still dripping blood though, and that’s not a good sign. But what Sam wasn’t told about if the gun shot wound on the other side, hastily taped shut by some tapes. Said tapes are not sticking very well due to all the blood coating it. There’s a certain number of cuts and scrapes over his torso that are healing, about the same colors of the one on his face. They must come from the same fight. But those fresh and bloody wounds are nothing like the scares he has.

His torso is covered in them. Sam has no idea what his version of serum can do, but he must have suffered some gruesome injury to have marks like that. Some dates from years ago, if Sam can judge them like scares on any other human body. He’s got a GSW scar just under his right collarbone, and Sam’s sure he has something behind it, it looks like a straight through shot. There’s a chunk of flesh missing over his left side that mark a small dent in his flank, and Sam isn’t sure if the patch running over his ribs are from a fire or acid, but it must have been horrible either way.

But even those are nothing compared to his left shoulder. Even without thinking about how wrong it looks to have a titanium arm grafted to the body like that, the line where the metal connect to the skin is horrid to look at. The skin is raised, an angry shade of red, and some places are oozing with what looks like pus. Sam thought that the serum was better than that. Steve can’t even catch a cold, and bioweapons makes him cough for a couple days for fuck’s sake.

Maybe it’s because the arm is "dead" as Bucky put it, because he doesn’t move it at all, and the weight seems to be hanging off the skin, pulling at it and tearing the seam of flesh and metal. The arm itself, well. There’s a couple of plates on the forearm all bend and wiring furiously, but the worst is where the bicep would be. It's literally torn out, with a couple of wires spilling out and three plates entirely missing. But the red star is still there, unscathed and unsullied.

“God...” Sam mutters and can’t help but touch the forearm where the plates are sticking out. Bucky hisses and jerks his entire body away and Sam recoils his hand.

“What? You can _feel_ it?” He chocks out. Bucky looks away and hugs his forearm against his stomach.

“The touch receptors were untouched.” He offers reluctantly, he sounds likes he’s talking through cotton. “Only thing that still works in it, how funny is that?” His tone drips with bitterness.

“Hilarious.” Sam confirms without any amusement in his voice. “I'm sorry, I'll be careful with it.” And for a second, Bucky look at him with a frown, like he can’t comprehend what Sam just said.

“I- thanks.” He nods, but this time it’s a small movement of his head, eyes still locked on the ugly but cheap couch he founds a couple of years ago. Sam doesn’t think for a second it’s as interesting as Bucky tries to make it, but simply the best thing to look at instead of Sam at this moment.

“Okay, first I need take off the tape to get a look at your wound, that okay with you?” He pulls a chair closer and put on a pair of nitrile gloves he keeps in the first aid kit.

“Yeah.” Bucky confirms, and Sam gets to work. He dumps a dose of antibacterial soap in the warm water before pealing off the tape, slowly reveling what is indeed a GSW. The bullet somehow missed anything vital. Either the guy is a bad shot or it was intended to not be fatal.

“How long?”

“Three days.” And if it looks like that in three days Bucky definitely has a better serum than they thought he had.

“You took the slug out?” He asks when he can see anything in the flesh.

“Yeah.”

“You shouldn’t have.” Sam pours a generous dose of soapy water on it, washing off the blood and any bit of fabric or dirt over it. “It wouldn’t have bleed that much.”

“I’m fine.” Bucky grunts as Sam rubs the skin around the hole.

“You’re not.” Sam still has to clean inside, but now he can get a clear look at it. Even though the skin is blown out around it, the wound is in extremely good shape, all thing considered. Nothing’s ripped inside and it’s not bleeding.

“How did you get it?”

“Shot me point blank.” Bucky grunts. And okay, if in three days a point blank GSW look like that, Sam doesn’t need to do anything to it, apart from cleaning it and making sure it keeps healing the way it did. There’s nothing he could do anyway; Bucky would need a trauma surgeon and an operating room, not a PJ with an EMT training on his table. So he moves to the other wound, because this one hasn’t stopped bleeding. He does the same as before: clean all the blood to get a look at it.

But this time it isn't so great. The skin’s got a red shade, and it’s starting to swell which isn’t good news. It's not as much of a perfunctory wound as a slash through the skin, but it is deep, deep enough to see through the skin to the fat tissue, and it’s gaping, wider than Sam’s comfortable leaving stitches free. Sam doesn’t even think of suggesting to go to the ER because if Bucky’s here and not in a hospital already it’s because he doesn’t want to be there in the first place. He sighs and look up at him.

“I’m gonna be honest here. The gunshot looks good enough, I'll just clean it and put a bandage over it because I can’t close it, there’s not much I can do apart from keeping an eye on it. The knife wound though... It’s starting to look infected, it’s red and hot. But the bleeding’s not stopping, and I ain’t got much here. I'm gonna trust that serum you have to somehow manage to heal from this-” he points to the gun shot scar over his shoulder that would’ve killed anyone, even with top of the art doctors because it’s straight through the lung. “-and I’ll stitch it, okay? How long have you got that one?”

“Same as the gunshot. They said the serum let me heal around twice as quick as a normal body.”

“So, I’m gonna suppose that you have at least a little boosted immune system too-” Sam is trying very hard to not scoff at himself, what is he doing, back-street surgery? Weak supposition, the medic back at his PJ training would tear him a new one if he said anything like that near him. “-and close it up, lather it with antibacterial cream, pumps you with antibiotics and hope you won’t die from septicemia, sounds good?”

“Sounds great.” Bucky mutters, and stands up. “I’m not lying on your couch; the table will do.” He says and awkwardly folds his clothes on the chair. He's got the shtick for stitching at least. And he’s okay with lying while Sam looms over him, it’s good. Sam moves his chair with his feet, careful to not touch anything with the gloves and watch as Bucky slowly lie down on his nice Ikea table. He hopes blood is easy to wash off wood.

“I don’t have anything to anesthetize you.” Sam tells him, looking for some thread and needles.

“Don’t.” Bucky all but growls, and there’s fear in his eyes, behind the whole feral looks. Sam holds up his hands, clear in his sight.

“You tell me, you can handle stiches like that? No anesthesia? I think I can dig up some local cream somewhere.” He offers, but the feral look doesn’t subside on Bucky’s face.

“I can handle it.” He says, and Sam nods, preparing needle drivers, antibacterial cream and enough bandage to dress it once he’s done.

“Okay, try to not move, and if you need me to stop, just say so.” Sam looks over the wound one more time, checking it’s clean before starting the first stich. He works quickly, efficiently because that’s how he was trained. He starts the first row of stitches on the dermis, closing up the deeper part of the cut with the absorbable string before closing up the epidermis, and the entire wound with the non-absorbable one. It’s a meager excuse to keep Bucky close, even he knows he could take them out on his own. Overall, it’s strenuous, painful work since Sam has to tug and pull at the flesh get to the deeper part of it. It's why some local anesthetic are given when possible.

He was expecting Bucky to move around, or at least show he felt some pain or discomfort. Instead, he lies there, perfectly still, eyes fixed on his ceiling but not moving, barely breathing and Sam can’t help but imagine the torture he lived through with Hydra. He saw some pictures; they were violent but scarce in his file keeping most of what he endured secret. The only reaction Sam gets is when he tugs a bit too hard on the thread, and Bucky let out a grunt. He mutters a hurried it's okay, keep going as if Sam was the one that needed to be reassured and goes back to lying still and quietly.

Sam wraps it up quickly, apply a small layer of cream and make sure the bandage covers it all. Does the same to the other wound, clean it one last time and cover it with a thick bandage, securely taped. Sam pushes the used needles away and help Bucky sits up, who barely lets out a frown at the clear pain he’s feeling.

“How you holding up?” Sam asks him, not daring to put his hands anywhere near him while he looks this out. Bucky still has his eyes locked on nothing, face blank. “Hey, Bucky? You with me?”

“I’m not Bucky.” He says, and Sam is quick to grab the handle of his gun behind his back and click off the safety. That's when Bucky catches his movement and turns to look at him. There’s a moment of silence where Sam thinks he’s dead, he’s reached the end and the Winter Soldier will kill him, that he’s pushed too far with his luck. Bucky is not moving, gripping the table with his left hand. His eyes go unfocused again, and he let his head fall. “I’m not him anymore. I think he died back in ‘44.” He says with a smaller voice, and Sam immediately feels how his heart spiked. He breaths out and try to control his hands.

“I’m not him anymore.” Bucky mutters and look down at his feet hanging from the table. Slowly, Sam click the security back on and take his hand away from his back.

“What do you want me to call you then?” He asks, trying to navigate the minefield that is Bucky. It seems to be the right things to say, because there’s a lighter tone in Bucky’s voice when he answers.

“I think James is good.” He looks up at him, this time with a very faint but present hopeful expression on his face. Jesus, is this the first time he introduces himself as James? Has he not done that before? Sam pushes this question to the _later_ pile he’s making in his head, the one that’s growing exponentially.

“Okay James. Sounds good.” And he wants to test the water. “Not as good a porn name as Bucky, but it’s nice.” He says tentatively, and to his surprise, James offers a small smile. It's barely there and gone in a second, but it’s a start. That’s good. “I need to look at your arm, you know.” He tells him, and James takes a short breath in, locking his hand on the edge of the table.

“I know. That's why I came here.” He says and his jaw tighten a couple of time, Sam can see the muscles moving and clenching under his stubbles.

“I can give you some light painkiller, won’t do much to you but it could help a bit.” Sam offers carefully.

“Nah, I need to feel it all if I want to help you with it.” He says and finally look up at Sam. “I suppose you got a tool box somewhere around here, right?” And Sam, Sam can only swallow his bile and nod.

“Yeah, I do.” He looks back at the shoulder, where the skin is a deep red, swollen and oozing pus. “You want me to clean it first?”

“Yeah, better do it now.” Sam does the same as he did to the knife wound, he cleans it, makes sure to rub a bit at it to dislodge any stuff stuck in there, but this time James barely holds in the pained sounds he keeps making. He flinches a couple of time and each time Sam quietly apologize and keeps going when James tells him to. It's more laborious because he’s being extra careful to not tug at either the skin or the metal. Sam's not sure where the infection comes from. It simply could be from the opened wounds running along the seam, but it could also be from poisoning from the metal, if James is no longer on the drugs mix Hydra used to give him. Another question to the _later_ list.

As he swipes the compress over the skin, Sam looks closer at the scarring, and he has to take a moment before speaking up. There are a couple of clinical looking scars, straight lines that are barely visible, typical scalpel cut, but alongside there are tears, deep canyon-like scaring that run along the raised skin of where the metal pushes against the skin. For them to be still so raw, they have to be recent, or recurrent ones.

But there’s something about the seam that’s not like anything Sam knows of. He has seen some metal embedded in skin, he has seen amputation scars and metal rod in bodies. None of them looked like that. The only thing he can compare the furled and rough skin to is-

“Are those... Burn marks?” He asks, and James keeps his head stubbornly still, fixing the wall in front of him.

“They had to make the metal stick to the skin.” He says under his breath, and Sam has to take a moment to just... Understand what James just told him. He knows he’s looking at him, he feels his eyes on the side of his skull, but Sam has trouble to register it because, right now, he’s mostly trying to not barf all over the open wound that is James's shoulder. The wave of sickness rolls from his stomach to his throat, and he’s struggling to find something to say.

“They _melted_ metal over your shoulder?” He looks back at the shoulder, where the rough metal now does look buried into the skin rather than sticking above it. The plates that cover the mechanisms stops right next to the edge, leaving the scars to be seen.

“It worked.” James shrugs with only his right side and Sam get the hint, he drops it. But his mind keeps coming back to it for a couple of minutes anyway, because how could he not?

Hydra melted metal on him, and even if he was sedated, the pain afterward must have been barely bearable. And Sam's more pessimistic side tells him that Hydra are a bunch of neo-nazis that used James as a guinea pig and weapon for over seven decades, so it’s more than likely they tested his pain threshold. Sam swallow bile back and occupies his hands by rubbing the antibacterial cream over the edge of the arm, because he can’t do much here.

“You got anything else you need me to look at?” He asks, stubbornly keeping his voice leveled.

“Just the arm.” James says, head still down. Sam, after he get a grip on himself, puts away his kit and gloves, now that the flesh wounds are taken care of.

“So, you know how it works? Your arm?”

“I wasn’t really trained to, but I watched the engineers and doctors work on it. And I broke into most of their bases, I've read all the files about it.” He says with a grim look. It couldn’t have been a nice read, Sam thinks.

“You know I’m not an engineer, right?” Sam stares at the arm. He knows enough about mechanic, he can fix most problems in his car, he knows his way around his wings and basic physic stuff, but a metal arm connected to a real human nervous system? Way out of his depth.

“I don’t need an engineer.” James says, this time while looking directly at Sam.

“Kinda look like you do though.”

“I just need you to shut down the touch receptors. I can deal with the rest later.” At that Sam ticks at that.

“Deal with what?” He asks.

“Most of the component are stocked in the upper arm, behind and under it, so it’s less likely to be damaged and harder to access to. Meaning it’s harder for me to access to it too.” James explains.

“What do you mean deal with the rest?” Sam insist, and James throws him a long, silent glance.

“You’re gonna need a small screwdriver, you gotta lift the fifth plates counting from top and then takes off the screw there to access to the pad.”

“You can keep ignoring me, but it won’t stop my questions you know.” He crosses his arms and decide to stare at James until he says something. And he stares back, the minutes are long but Sam doesn’t bulge an inch. Maybe he didn’t get his Mama patience but he sure got her stern look she used to throw at him and his sister.

“Fine.” James says and look away. “There’s a kill switch in my arm. It stops my arm from functioning, and I’m pretty sure there’s a dose of poison in it.”

“Okay, so we’re not going to deal with that later, I’ll do it right now.” Sam shakes his head and keeps the slight panic in his head quiet. “Where is it?”

“It can wait.”

“No, it can’t. You want to be the one to explain to Steve why you died on my couch because you didn’t want to take the literal ticking bomb in your arm out?” James frown, looks away but doesn’t say anything. “So, I’m asking again. Where is it?”

“Where the triceps would be. There’s a vial stuck in a nook, that’s the poison. I can’t reach.” Thanks to the thorn open plates, Sam can see the spot James’s talking about. There is a small vial full of a pale greenish liquid behind panels and wires and other metals bits. With a small screwdriver and an even smaller pliers, Sam slowly unscrew the vial and pop it out of the arm like one does with an old battery. It would be too easy, if James’s constant flinches and fear of breaking the and killing him weren’t so heavy in his mind.

But he manages after some long minutes, and he gently drops the vial on the table, unsure of what it would do if the glass where to break.

“You know what it is?”

“No. It’s something Hydra’s synthetized in their lab, strong enough to take an enhanced out. I destroyed the last reserves about 3 months ago. That’s the last vial I know of.” He promptly pockets it, and Sam guesses it’s better to destroy it rather than risk someone finding it. Even the good guys.

“The Prazaroki base?” He chooses to say instead.

“Yes.” James doesn’t ask how Sam knows, because he certainly knows already that he was there two days later with Steve trying to pick something from the rumbles. James takes a deep breath in before speaking again. “You have to unscrew a panel under the arm to access the main panel.” He says, and Sam follows his lead. 

It’s easy at first, taking out two small screw, taking off a small panel of titanium, but the next part isn’t so easy. Following James’s instruction, he has to spot different wires and follow a slightly darker grey one. And for that he has to move the arm around, stick two screwdrivers and a couple fingers inside to get to the touch receptors controls, and James is making sounds rather close to whine that Sam chooses to ignore. The arm is whirring fervently until Sam finally spot that small indent where the wire attaches, and he promptly cuts it off.

As soon as his pliers snap, James’s entire body seems to sag, and he let out a loud, broken sob that Sam didn’t even think a human being was capable of making. When he looks up James has turned his head away, but he can see his chest heaving, he can hear him sniffling quietly. He glances at his right hand and it’s shaking, even though it’s holding so tightly on the wood his knuckles are bright white. Sam feels his heart tug in his throat. Damn him and his caring nature, never brought him any good, no matter what his Mama says. He gently screws the panel back on before speaking, trying to not move the arm around too much.

“How much did it hurt?” He asks despite his better judgment.

“A lot.” James admits and wipe at his eyes. Sam can’t see if he actually cried or just making sure it doesn’t happen, but either way he keeps his head turned away from Sam.

“How long did you have your arm like that?”

“Six days.” Sam nods and wordlessly closes the lid he opened under his arm.

“You okay?”

“Not really, but it’s fine.” He takes a deep breath and look at Sam. “I got the three plates dislodged in my bag. I have to put them back on or else it’ll fuck up the wires inside.” Sam notes how he turns his words in order to not directly asks Sam to do it.

“Sure.” Sam pick up his bag on the floor and gives it to James after opening it. Once again, James seems surprised by the gesture but he quickly schools his face and nod at Sam. He picks three long pieces of metal from the bag and hands them to Sam.

“So, how do I do that?” He follows James’s instruction carefully, how to plug the plates into the system, to attach them correctly, but without full control of the arm, nor the right tools, neither of them can check if it’s really fixed or not. In the end, the arm has all his plates again, but no way to make sure they’re connected, and two on his forearm are still weirdly bent.

“Need something else?” He asks, eyes locked on James.

“No, you did enough.” James marks a pause and worries the jeans over his knee. “I, huh- I just, want to- Thank you, for helping me out.”

“You’re welcome.” A part of Sam wants to tell him he shouldn’t have to say thank you for getting help, but Sam really doesn’t want to dismiss the obvious effort he made to say those two words, and neither does he want to take the importance out of what he did, coming to Sam to get help. And there’s another part of Sam who remembers how he got grounded at the Triskelion and how helpless he felt at that moment without his wings. He can be mature about it but there’s limit to selflessness.

Sam closes the tool box, pushes it away and drops in a nearby chair. It’s only once he’s sitting that he realizes how his heart has been pumping. He closes his eyes despite the presence of James in the same room as him and takes a moment to breath, slowly in and out. There’s a dog barking in his building, he sounds like Duke, his neighbor from the other side of the floor’s dog, a big mastiff that wag his tail hard enough to hit Sam’s shins when he goes to run every morning.

The music has changed to some forgettable boy band he distinctly remembers Sarah put on the mix to annoy him, and Sam wonders how long they’ve been in his living room. There would be an awkward silence if not for their harmonized chorus. When Sam opens his eyes, he sees that ugly green towel stained by blood, but mostly he sees James, still sitting on the table with his back straight, arm stiff and close to his torso. Sam doesn’t know what to say now that he doesn’t have an urgent matter to care for. His pararescue brain has shut off again. In the end, it’s James that breaks the silence.

“I should leave.” He says, voice tight and soft.

“No way man.” Sam sit up and rub a hand over his face. “You’re staying here, I’m going to feed you something and then we’ll talk, alright?” James seems to think it over for a moment, before nodding. He was just waiting for an excuse to stay. He’s not choosing, someone wants him to do that so it’s okay to indulge.

“Okay.” James drops to the ground, and when Sam sees the way his metal arm hangs off his body, tugging at the skin he just cleaned, he has an idea.

“That arm, can’t you do anything about it? Doesn’t it hurt?”

“Obviously it hurts.” James says after a beat, like he’s talking to a slow child.

“I meant-” Sam rubs at his face again. He’s tired, more now that the adrenaline is dropping. “I think I have a sling for you, it might help.” James stares at Sam.

“Yeah, it might. Maybe.” So Sam gets up walk to his bathroom, where he takes a moment to wash his hands and splash some water on his face, letting his pulse slow down.

When he comes back, James is slowly putting his shirt back, and he’s surprisingly careful with his stitches. Without a word, Sam hands him the blue sling he found behind some boxes. It’s a bit old, and dusty, but it’ll help redistribute the weight of the arm across his chest and shoulders. He watches silently as James struggles to adjust the straps behind his neck. He’s ready to offer his help, but James seems to handle it fine. He knows first hand how infuriating it is when people constantly offer their help instead of letting you ask for it. And James seems to be willing to ask, or he wouldn’t be here.

“Good?” he asks when James sighs and let his shoulders falls down. There seems to be less pressure on his left shoulder.

“Yeah, ‘s good.” He adjusts the arm inside the sling before sitting down on the closest chair with a grunt.

“You’ll be nice with those stitches okay? I don’t wanna redo them.” Sam walks back to his kitchen to get some stuff. “You could probably do with eating something, you know?” He fetches one of his Gatorade he keeps for when he’s running, which admittedly he hasn’t been doing a lot as of lately and hands it to James, as well as a couple of protein bar he found lonely on his cupboards. Upon seeing the bottle, James recoils, and glares at it.

“Oh, come one, you just let me stick a screwdriver in your arm, and you think I'm gonna do something to you now?” James at least seems to look a bit ashamed at that thought, and school his face. “Here,” Sam walks closer and show him the lid of the orange bottle. “Closed, see?” He opens it and swallow a big mouthful of it, the sugar almost sour on his tongue. It is three a.m. after all. Or maybe four, he’s not sure. “Nothing in it, you can drink it.” He gives him the bottle, and James accept it. He takes a sip, and Sam will forever ask God, fate, whoever is out there that manage the world how he got to watch the Winter Soldier scrunch up his nose, frown at the bottle and set it away from him on the table like a toddler does with a particularly disgusting food. He swears James is this close to pulling his tongue out and say _ew_ out loud.

“Not good?” Sam is only laughing a little.

“Too sweet.” James answers, but he accepts the protein bar without a word, and the glass of water Sam gives him. In the meantime, Sam makes himself tea because he wants to try to get some sleep later and he’s already reached his coffee quota for today, although technically it is tomorrow. He watches as the water boil, let James have a moment for himself. Really, it’s more for Sam to get his bearing and decides what to do next, but it makes him feel more brave to pretend it’s for James.

Once the water’s hot, and after he poured an ungodly amount of milk in his mug, he comes sit in front of James. He’s pretty sure he should wipe the blood off the table while it’s not completely dry.

“You know we gotta talk, right?” He starts with. “You can’t just show up on my door like that without having me asks questions.”

“I know.” James says, and his voice seems a lot calmer than it was five minutes ago. “What do you want to know?”

“Why did you come to me?”

“You seemed like the best option.”

“Why not Steve?” James looks away, almost in shame Sam thinks if he showed anything more than a frown or twist of lips.

“I don’t know.”

“I think you do.”

“I didn’t want him to see me. Not like that anyway.” It’s a start.

“But you want him to see you.” Sam guesses.

“Eventually, yeah.” James finishes the second protein bar and start playing with the wrapping, folding it and flattening it between his fingers. He’s really dexterous with only one hand, he even makes a small triangle out of the foil. Sam waits until he speaks again. “I’m scared of what he’ll do, what he’ll think of me.”

“You know you’re his friend, right?”

“But am I?” There’s a tilt in his voice, shame and fear, and his face speaks louder than his words. There’s been seventy years of torture between James and what Steve remembers him to be.

“Why me?” Sam decides to ask, steering him away from that subject for now.

“You have medical training.” He says, and Sam suspect it’s not the only reasons.

“You seemed to do okay with the gunshot wound, and the knife wound could’ve been okay with a proper bandage and some pills. Why are you here? For real?”

“I need help.” Sam is patient, even though he’d love to say so you’ve mentioned. “I know I’ll never be who I was, but I want to be me again. A version of me at least. I want to feel like a real person.” He confesses. “And I know I can’t do that, not while I’m running from everything. I need to settle, to be at peace again. And I don’t know where to start, how to do it. Who do I ask for that? I can’t just ask ‘make me human again’ to anyone, you know.” He trying to fold the wrapper as small as possible, and so far, he has four folds.

“Okay.” Sam says, simple as that. James looks up, frowning. “We can do that.” There’s relief washing his face. “You can stay with me a couple day. After that, you’re gonna see Steve.” And he’s sitting back, closing his body language again.

“No I’m not.” He says, very adamant on it.

“Yes you are. He’s your friend, and he’s worried about you. I’m not asking you to become an Avenger or to get yourself to justice.” Sam explains, and that makes James recoils even more. “I just want to reassure Steve, who is my friend too, that you’re not dying in a gutter somewhere in Munich.” James doesn’t say anything. “We’ll get you some help for your arm, and in the mean time we’ll talk about the options you have, okay?” And James seems to want to argue against that, but after a couple second of hesitation, all sign of struggle disappears from his face and he resolves himself.

“Okay.” James nods. “If you think that’s what I have to do.” And that is a lot of trust from him. Sam isn’t sure how he should react to that. Why does he put so much of himself into his hands?

“You want to get better.” Sam states clearly. “It won’t be a smooth ride.” He’s honest, because one thing he hated was people sugar coating the truth and finding the harsh reality later. “But first, we’ll work on finding your road, then finding your bike, then learning how to ride it down the road and how to not be upset when you fall. Learn to get back on it after being mad about falling for a little while.”

“Did you find that bike?” James asks him, and it seems to be more than polite curiosity. Sam nods once. He struggled for a long time, Riley’s death heavy on his mind, but he had to learn to live with his guilt and nightmares and fits of depression. There’s not much to be done but to keep going, trying as each day go by.

“And I still fall down sometimes, even after years of riding it.” Sam adds, because not even a year ago he had to push himself to not hate Steve who got his best friend back. He spent weeks alone thinking about it before Sarah called and forced him outside his flat. Something flashes in James’s eyes that Sam can’t really pinpoint. It’s something sad, halfway to hopeful.

“But that’s for tomorrow.” Sam sips some of that chamomile good night tea mix he tried years ago and never let go. It’s good, and the taste alone calm his nerves because he’s used to drink that with Sarah when they feel down, and his sister is the one thing that will always cheer him up. “You can have my couch for the night, please keep some towel around so you don’t soak it in blood if the stitches rip. I’ll get you some pillow and a blanket too.”

“And tomorrow?” James asks.

“Tomorrow I’ll have breakfast, and I’ll start on my annual re-watch of Stargate.” James nods. Stay silent for a while before speaking up.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Can I stop the music before I get an eviction letter?” Sam finishes his tea with a shadow of a laugh from James, and he thinks he’ll be okay. They’ll both be okay. As long as you keep trying, things get better.

**Author's Note:**

> There might be some follow up chapters, because as I was writing I started to see where this relationship could go, but tbh don’t hold your breath. And I think this is enough on its own to tell the story I wanted to tell. Anyway, hope you liked it.
> 
> Also, Sam is a nerd too he’s just more elegant about it than Steve or Bucky, don’t @ me.


End file.
